Wall Street Journal
February 3, 2012
Euro-zone private-sector activity returned to modest growth in January, but a fall in consumer spending in the run-up to Christmas added to doubts over the region's longer-term prospects.
Markit Economics on Friday said its final composite purchasing managers index confirmed a rise to 50.4 from 48.3 in December, putting it just above the 50.0 threshold that indicates growth.
That is the first growth reading for the 17-nation currency bloc in five months, and reinforces hopes the currency bloc may rebound in the first quarter after a likely slump in the last three months of 2011.
But the strong reading contrasts with a dismal set of retail sales figures for December, underscoring the weak outlook for the economy later in the year.
Eurostat, the European Union's statistics agency, Friday said the volume of retail sales in the euro zone fell 0.4% from November and by 1.6% from December 2010. The decline came despite hefty discounting by retailers.
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